Prospecting & Detecting
Growing Up Gold
October 2015 by Amanda Fitzhugh
If you’re going to successfully detect nuggets you must not only know a little about finding gold and detecting, but you also need to know your own limits, have a dash of luck and a lot of persistence.
How To File A Mining Claim
Filing claims is actually quite easy, though there are a number of pitfalls that you should watch out for. Over the years, I have made just about every mistake you can with a mining claim, and have learned a few things to watch out for along the way.
Eolian Placer Gold
I would first like to mention that I am not a geologist. I have, however, spent the last 8 years intently searching for gold nuggets with a metal detector. I have found gold in numerous locations, and in several different types of gold deposits.
Dry Washer, Wet System or Metal Detector?
I love to dry wash old nugget patches found by detector operators, and I have found my fair share of gold dry washing those areas. I have also found a few nuggets using a detector on the bedrock exposed by dry washing the patches.
Revisiting the Rocker Box
The first location we worked was a small, dry ravine cutting through many mineralized zones in an area where some hard rock mining had taken place in the past.
Return to Chicken, Alaska
I figured it would be quite conservative of me to shoot for about four ounces of gold instead of the twelve ounces I had found in 2013.
The Essentials of Dry Washing
Most dry washers have a feed rate adjustment. It needs to be set so that the material flows evenly over the riffles and does not bury them.
Mud Men: Pocket Miners of Southwest Oregon Part III
The amount of gold in the traces from the low-grade scattered veinlets may be much more than the traces from the small but rich pocket, at least until the pocket hunter closes in on the rich pocket. Further confusion arises if the prospector stumbles across a placer deposit on one of the higher peaks.
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